The colonel looked gratified. "Very well. I appreciate your concern, Lieutenant. Thank you."
"Thank you, sir," Lieutenant Newhouse said saluting. Then he turned on his heel and left the office.
He moseyed over to the broad swath of green park that had been left as a relaxation spot when the base had been built. It wasn't crowded; there were only two or three men sitting on the benches, smoking and talking quietly. Newhouse found a bench to himself and sat down to mull things over.
There was nothing totally new in the situation here on Dynak. Newhouse, as a trouble-shooter, knew that, even if Colonel Hastings didn't. Dynak was one of the many worlds which Man had decided not to colonize in spite of its inviting appearance. The biochemistry of the plants and animals was just a little too different to be compatible with Man, which meant that the planet would have to be wiped clean and started over in order to provide a suitable environment for human beings. And, aside from the fact that such a step would mean destroying millions of species that would better be preserved for study, it would mean the death of the several million humanoid natives of the planet—something that Man had no desire to be responsible for.
Dynak Base was not a military establishment; the Space Force as a whole used only a minor part of its energies for military purposes. Most of its activities were scientific in nature. Nonetheless, any base such as this had to be fortified to a certain extent. There were tribes of humanoids in the immediate vicinity which were, like all such cultural units at that stage of development, intensely hostile to anything strange. Right now, the majority of them were warily friendly with the Earthmen, but there was no way of knowing how long that uneasy peace might last. Meanwhile, they were doing useful work—bringing in samples of various types of fauna and flora for the labs to work on.
It all sounded fine so far, Newhouse thought grumpily. But the catch lay in the word "humanoid." Any reasonably intelligent race was classified as "humanoid" if they were erect, bifurcate animals—a definition which covered a multitude of variations. Most of them you wouldn't want to meet alone in a dark alley, and if you did, it would be a toss-up as to which of you would be the most frightened. Oddly-colored skins, three-eyed faces, and other outré features were not at all uncommon among them.
Dynak was different. The humanoids were near human. The brown-yellow pigment in their skins wasn't melanin, and it was another pigment that gave them the intensely blue-violet eye coloring; they had different kinds of glands inside, arranged differently; they were almost entirely hairless, except for soft patches of down on the top of the head; and they averaged about four feet seven in height. Not human, no. Definitely not homo sapiens.
But they certainly looked human. And, to top the whole thing off, the females were, to an Earthman's eyes, as pretty as little dolls. Except that dolls are normally not built so enticingly.
They weren't all beautiful, true, but there were enough beauties to tempt the weary Earthman. And those who weren't weary were even more tempted.